


Sweet Kiss

by Mendicantelle



Category: Hannibal (TV), Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types
Genre: Crossover, Hannibal Lecter Loves Will Graham, I've evidently already lost my sanity, M/M, No I didn't get the fandom wrong, Swearing, What have you got to lose, Will Graham is So Done, there are actually Pokemon in this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:20:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26838856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mendicantelle/pseuds/Mendicantelle
Summary: He’s wearing a full three-piece suit, of all things, in a check pattern that makes Will’s eyes go funny if he stares at it too hard, and has a face that looks as if some ancient sculptor had got hold of the perfect bit of marble and then thought “what this stone really needs is cheekbones. Yeah. Cheekbones you could beat down walls with.”
Relationships: Will Graham & Hannibal Lecter, Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 8
Kudos: 38





	Sweet Kiss

**Author's Note:**

> Sweet Kiss - a Normal or Fairy-type move - “The user kisses the target with a sweet, angelic cuteness that causes confusion.”
> 
> I’ve gone beyond ashamed of my life choices and waaaay out the other side. You don’t need to point this out. I’m aware.

It’s sunset. Finally. The weather is on the turn, and the trees surrounding the road up to the Wolf Trap Gym are starting to show the edges of orange and red more evidently in the low sunlight. 

Will Graham sits on the porch where, as always, he has the best view of the long track that brings people to his door. After a long summer, the trail is churned and well-trodden, marked by the hundreds of hopeful feet (and paws, and hooves) of the trainers and their Pokémon who came to throw down their challenges. Some days it was relentless: at one particularly bad point during the hottest month, there had been a queue. 

A  _ queue _ . 

Having people visit is bad enough, but the idea of them lining up around the block for a crack at him makes Will both horrified and low-level angry. None of them had got their gym badge that day. It had been a Bad Day.

Winston nudges at him, rumbling a soft, worried growl. 

“I know,” Will says, reaching up to thread his fingers into the Arcanine’s heavy mane. “Why’d I pick a job like this anyway. It’s not like I didn’t know they’d come. What they’d expect from me.”

The problem is of course that he didn’t pick it, not really: it seemed to have picked him. He hadn’t intended to become a Pokémon master, for a number of reasons that he’d learnt not to go into with anyone other than his own reflection. The creatures just - melded into him. Like he was the Pokémon whisperer or some bullshit. He always knew how his partners were feeling, how they were going to move, whether they had that extra burst of fight left in them or not. When he dueled he wasn’t Will Graham and Winston - he was Winston, all roar and fire and motion. 

People kept telling him they’d never seen anything like it. 

_ You’re so lucky. _

_ I’d give anything to understand my Pokémon like you do. _

You wouldn’t, Will thought. You really wouldn’t. His fingers tighten in Winston’s thick fur. 

“I’m sorry,” he says, as he does a hundred times over, every year. Winston tosses his head and huffs. “No, I am. I don’t care that you don’t want my apologies. I still am.”

Sometimes, when Will is in the darkest of moods (which seems to be very often these days - his head hurts, his body hurts - this must be what aging is like) he gets lost in the sheer wrongness of society and finds himself in an emotional dead-end. 

Our children grow up with an indoctrinated dream of perfection. We all know that we should want to be the best, the very best, and nothing else will do. And the way to get to that goal is to fight. Anyone and everyone. But we don’t do the fighting ourselves, oh no. We get an animal - a sentient creature - to fight for us. We train them, not just to fight, but to love us. To fight, to burn, to hurt, to ache - and to want it. 

It’s the most ghastly Stockholm-Syndrome nightmare Will can think of. And society is founded on it. 

When he had taken his starter Pokémon, a Lillipup, he had been charmed by the little creature’s eyes, fur, the way she looked at him with unquestioning devotion as the professor placed her into his arms. He knew she loved him. He knew she trusted him. What he didn’t understand was why. He’d done nothing to earn that depth of feeling. 

Maybe people just didn’t deserve dog Pokémon. 

And then he’d had his first real duel and it all went to hell. 

On the porch, Will shakes his head to dispel the memory, rises, and decides to get a beer. It’s the end of the day, at the end of a long and awful summer, and he can drink now. He tries not to drink in front of the kids when they come - and they’re always kids, on the cusp of becoming adults, their Pokémon just as stroppy and uncomfortable as they are in their skins. He tries to be the gym leader they’re expecting. Ready and willing to share his skills and his praise and, of course, his badges. 

(He’s heard that the Wolf Trap badge is highly sought after, not just because of the beautiful Stantler design, but because he’s considered a real trophy to beat. He doesn’t care.)

Just as he’s got his hand on the door, Winston barks, that deep tiger-wolf sound familiar, and Will’s heart sinks. That means someone’s coming up the track. The day isn’t over after all. He turns, sighs, expecting the usual gaggle of kids, maybe a lone teenager. 

But it isn’t. 

It’s a grown man. 

He’s tall. Will can see him coming even at this distance, and usually the kids stay hidden by the brow of the hill for far longer. And while he seems to be moving leisurely, the length of his legs is evidently bringing him in deceptively fast. He has a pack on his back and a sturdy-looking hiking stick in one hand. 

Unusually, Winston continues to bark, and one by one the rest of Will’s seven-strong team - from the massive bulk of the Houndour down to the tiny newcomer, the Rockruff - start to join in, until there’s an embarrassingly loud doggy chorus echoing off the battered walls of the gym. 

“Stop it!” Will hisses, not wanting to shout because somehow joining in with the general cacophony feels like the worst kind of failure. “Stop -”

He gives Winston a rebuking shove, and the Arcanine jumps down, heads inside. After a moment, the noise subsides, although the little Rockruff can still be heard yipping at sporadic intervals. “Buster,” Will mutters through clenched teeth, “you’re sleeping in your Pokéball tonight.”

He feels the stab of rejection from the little creature and closes his eyes briefly against it. 

“Will Graham?”

Will’s eyes fly open. He must have had them closed longer than he thought, because the stranger is now standing in his garden, at a polite distance from the porch, at the very edge of the roughly-marked sand ring that serves as a duelling circle. He’s wearing a full three-piece suit, of all things, in a check pattern that makes Will’s eyes go funny if he stares at it too hard, and has a face that looks as if some ancient sculptor had got hold of the perfect bit of marble and then thought “what this stone really needs is cheekbones. Yeah. Cheekbones you could  _ beat down walls _ with.”

And he’s got two Pokéballs on his belt. It looks like an outrageously expensive belt, but the Pokéballs are perfectly normal, a Standard and a Dusk ball. 

“Yes,” Will says, trying not to straighten his collar or run a hand through his hair. He feels unkempt just being near this man. “That’s me. Wolf Trap Gym Leader.”

Buster chooses that precise moment to start yipping as if all the Gastly in the world are grabbing at his tail, and Will cringes internally. 

The man gives a faint smile. 

“It’s good to meet you, Will. My name is Doctor Hannibal Lecter.”

It says something about the kind of summer Will’s had that he barely bats an eyelid. After a constant stream of teenagers calling themselves things like Ash Ketchum and Rainbow Moonchild and other similar crap, grown-ass men called Hannibal are hardly a surprise. The accent is unusual, but something about the cut of the man’s clothes and his phlegmatic profile suggests Crown City. Inside the gym Winston growls, not his usual alert bark but a full-bodied primeval sound that makes the hairs on the back of Will’s neck stand up. Hannibal Lecter turns his head, listening, and in the low, red light of the setting sun his eyes seem almost maroon. 

“Winston,” Will shouts, and the growl subsides. “Sorry. They’re kind of tired. Anyway, can I help you? There isn’t a Pokémon Center here if that’s what you’re looking for. I know a lot of gyms have one nearby, but my gym -”

“ -is special,” says Lecter, and nods.

“I was gonna say ‘under-resourced’, but whatever.” Will gives the man a quick once-over, avoiding that maroon gaze. He doesn’t like eye contact at the best of times, but he can cope (just about) with snot-nosed kids. This man, older than him, grey in his hair, an air of unassailable confidence - he’s a different matter. The hair on the back of his neck hasn’t gone down, and it prickles at his collar as he gives in and adjusts it. Something’s wrong. “Professor Mulberry lives about six miles away if -”

“Actually,” says Lecter, and he is taking off his backpack, leaning it up against the nearest tree - then off comes the jacket as well, revealing perfect white shirtsleeves - “I came to see you.” One big hand rests comfortably, expectantly, on the belt at his waist. 

Will realises, after dumbly staring at the bizarre spectacle in front of him like a yokel for a moment, that this man is  _ preparing for a duel _ . 

“You want to  _ fight _ me?”

Hannibal looks at him with a sort of infuriatingly placid innocence. 

“That is what gym leaders are for, yes?”

“Aren’t you a little old for gym badges?” Will hears himself blurting, then almost instantly wants to crawl into his own ass and die. Lecter’s faint smile returns, broadens, and with that expression Will suddenly feels a cold clutch of dread. Inexplicable, unwarranted, but all-consuming. The gym doors fly open, Winston and Max barrelling through it to come and flank their trainer, heads down and tails not wagging. 

Will finds his eyes drawn back to the belt, the two innocently normal-looking Pokéballs. Now they just seem sinister. This man has to be a pure Ghost-type, Dark-type or Psychic-type trainer, and Will hates battling those. Add his age and presumably experience into the mix and it’s entirely possible he’s got something really nasty in there, something hard-won and long-trained. And two is hardly a full team. What can this Doctor Lecter possibly have that he feels secure to duel with an incomplete team? 

Will has the sudden, uncomfortable realisation that it’s not the badge he wants. It’s the whole gym. This is a takeover bid. Has to be. God, it had to happen eventually. He’s been lucky, he supposes - too small, too out of the way to use as part of an empire-building plan. This guy doesn’t look like Team Rocket or Team Skull or any of the big players, so presumably he’s playing for his own amusement and personal gain. 

Somehow, that’s  _ worse _ . 

Hannibal Lecter chuckles, and Will shivers. 

“You’re never too old to try new things,” he says. “Shall we?”

His hand closes around the standard ball, grips, unclips, and weighs it in his palm. 

“Winston,” says Will, never taking his eyes off the red-and-white flicker of movement as Lecter gently tosses the ball up, catches it, tosses it, catches. The Arcanine huffs out warm breath into the darkening air. “I choose you.”  _ And I’m sorry _ , he adds, silently, as he always does. Winston steps forward unhesitatingly, and Will’s heart aches. 

Lecter doesn’t say a word. Doesn’t throw the ball. Doesn’t even twitch, as far as Will can see - and yet the ball opens with its familiar flash and glare of light, releasing the creature within, which comes to rest in a flurry of fallen leaves a few feet in front of Lecter’s impeccable leather hiking boots. 

Winston, who had been puffed up and half-crouched in preparation, makes a small, throaty sound - “ _ Arc _ ?!” and turns his head back to look at Will, who almost shrugs in a  _ hell-you-expect-me-to-say _ fashion and just - stares. 

“Pika!”

A tiny yellow face beams back at Will, little pink tongue just poking out, bright button eyes alight with saccharinely adorable cheeriness. It’s like seeing a spotless Bentley drive up and then watching sixteen grubby meth clowns climb out of it. It’s weird and it’s wrong and Will hasn’t the faintest idea what to do or say. Winston just sneezes loudly, wrong-footed now he’s not facing the Darkrai or Chandelure he’d been expecting.

“Pika-pi!” chirrups Lecter’s Pokémon, unabashed, looking back for its trainer and giving a delighted little skip when it sees him there. Hannibal smiles paternally at it, and the creeps crawl slowly back up Will’s spine for some reason. 

“My starter,” Lecter says, and the little creature scurries toward him, clutches at his ankle and rubs its furry little face into the heavy fabric as if it’s the best thing in the world to be close to him. Will feels his face heat, oddly. “As I said, Will - it’s good to try new things and you’re never too old to learn, I’m told. He needs practice and it’s hard to find trainers who will -”

For the first time, the older man looks down, seems embarrassed. Will gets it. There’s no real guts or glory to be had by beating down a really old dude’s inexperienced starter Pokémon. It’s just kind of sad. He can see why other young trainers avoid it. It’s only fun to fight old guys ( _ like me _ , Will thinks,  _ just admit it _ ) when they’re a challenge. 

“Ohhh-kay,” he says, eventually, and Hannibal looks up again, the Pikachu now on his shoulder, nuzzling in under his silvering hair and cooing into his ear. Will tries to stop being creeped out and see it as cute. He’s only partially successful. “So, you do know how to -”

Winston abruptly yelps and stumbles back, his big back paws scraping furrows in the leaf litter. 

Somehow without a word from its trainer, without even a hair being pushed out of place, Lecter’s Pikachu has rushed the Arcanine with Quick Attack and is now strutting triumphantly on all fours around the ring, muttering “pi- _ pi _ -pi” to itself as Winston growls and shakes his annoyance off. 

“I  _ do _ apologise,” says Lecter serenely. “He’s rather enthusiastic.”

“Yeah,” says Will. “I see that. Winston, Take Down.”

Winston rumbles in complete accord. Will can feel his emotions, flickering like the fire he is, and he’s keen to squash the little rodent. The Pikachu isn’t ready for it, and is knocked back against a nearby tree with a truncated squeak as the air is knocked from its lungs. Will winces, his bond to Winston taking a momentary back seat to his human empathy. He’s not as attuned to the other Pokémon as he is to Winston, but he senses the shock and dismay and feeling of  _ failed-failed-failed _ as the tiny yellow thing gets up, wavers dizzily, and looks back at Lecter for support. Its small round face is scrunched up in misery. 

This is why Will hates duelling, why it hurts him every single time. He can’t bear it. These beasts - they go in with such love, such determination, and they get hurt. Rushing headlong into something they know will cause them pain. All for love. All for him. His first Lillipup had been utterly steamrollered in her first fight, and Will still isn’t sure if he’s got over it, the shared feelings he had with her as she fainted. She was ready to kill for him. Die for him. 

He doesn’t  _ deserve _ that kind of love. 

Lecter doesn’t say anything to comfort or indeed direct his Pikachu. He just meets its eyes, cocks his head very slightly with a tiny frown creasing between his eyes, and the little animal’s ears perk up, very slightly. 

“Pi _ ka _ ,” it says, sounding weary but determined.

For the first time, Will feels like one of those kids who stare up at him and say  _ “I wish I could be like you, Pokémon Master Graham.” _

Lecter doesn’t use words. No yelling, no gesticulating, no showboating. Not even any evident emotion. But his Pikachu just  _ knows _ . It turns, darts forward, with that uncanny speed. 

It must be the light of the sun, but for a moment there Will thinks the little black button eyes are gleaming the darkest maroon-red. 

“ _ Winston _ ! Flamethr-”

The Pikachu is already past Winston’s big front paws and then performs a vertical take-off so that it’s level with the huge muzzle, the snapping jaws behind which the embers are already burning - 

At the zenith of its leap, the Pikachu beams with pure joy into Winston’s furious face. Sticks out its tiny pink tongue with a coquettish chirp, rubs little red cheek to big black nosepad. 

“Aaaaa-chu, aaaa _ aaaachu _ ,” it coos. And plants a big smacking kiss directly in the centre of Winston’s baffled expression. 

Will staggers with the force of Winston’s complete Confusion - and also not a little because suddenly he feels as if Hannibal Lecter has snuck up on him, enfolded him firmly in the arms of that bizarre check suit and then licked a full, hungry and seductive line up the length of his jaw. 

His face instantly  _ burns _ . He doesn’t dare look over at Lecter. He can feel every sensation as if it’s happening right now, that warm breath ghosting over his skin, a low chuckle in that oddly accented tone, the unexpected strength of those arms around him. God, he can smell the man’s cologne, and it’s so - 

He snaps out of it as Winston makes a sound between a cough and a roar, and spits out a gout of flame. The Pikachu is hurled aside, but Winston is whining. He’s hurt himself in his confusion. Will rushes to him, curls his arms around that big neck. “It’s all right,” he says. “It’s all right. I’m sorry. I - I wasn’t concentrating - “

Something about Winston’s sooty, eye-rolling expression says  _ no shit, Graham. And we both know why.  _

Finally he manages to look over at Lecter, and his embarrassment and annoyance evaporate as he sees the man gently scooping up his Pikachu, which has fainted. The doctor’s big hands cup around his partner and hold it, and the phantom sensation of being held in that implacable grip subsumes Will once again. He swallows, hard. “Shit. I’m sorry. I should have gone easier on him.”

“Not at all,” Hannibal Lecter says, running one thumb carefully over the tiny creature’s head. There is a deep graze there, blood staining the bright, sunny fur. “But since the Pokémon Center is such a distance, and it is getting late - perhaps I could trouble you for some supplies?”

Winston growls, and Will shushes him. 

“Of course,” he says. “Come on in.”

He ends up inviting Lecter to stay the night. By the time they’re done patching up the Pikachu it’s almost full dark and starting to rain, and despite his general hatred of houseguests Will can’t bring himself to turn a visitor with a wounded Pokémon out into the night. There’s a couple of old cots in the back room, leftovers from when Will still entertained the crazy idea that he might be able to stomach live-in students, so he finds himself shaking out musty blankets and digging in the closet for any spare pillows while Hannibal Lecter feeds his team, tipping out the bowls of chow as Will’s pack runs riot around him, barking and chasing tails. The Pikachu sleeps soundly in Winston’s basket, in front of the fire, the bandages around its head giving it an oddly rakish look. 

Wondering if he has anything other than Pokémon food in the house to offer his guest, Will opens the big cupboard and promptly staggers back with a hiss of breath through his teeth as something leaps from the top shelf directly into his face and blunders past him with an aggressive “kk-K-k _ hkkk _ !” 

“Fuck,” says Will with feeling, his heart hammering and headache worsening as blood pounds through his temples. “The fuck. Was that.”

He jumps again as he feels a hand land gently on his shoulder and squeeze. Hannibal Lecter has somehow materialized directly behind him without a sound. 

“Now. That is no way to thank our host for his hospitality,” Hannibal says, in a tone of mild reprimand, directing his remarks to the shadows on top of the fridge. The thing hiding up there makes a grumbling “m _ mm _ \--kkh!” sound that Will is pretty sure means  _ fuck-your-hospitality _ in Pokémon talk. Then it throws a half-eaten stale poffin at him. “I am sorry, Will,” Hannibal says, and he really does sound sorry. “He didn’t take kindly to being caught, and he’s been a little wild ever since.” The maroon eyes seem to sparkle, and the fingers of the hand still on Will’s shoulder tighten, almost imperceptibly. “I hope you understand.”

“Yeah,” says Will, very slowly, as the lolling, broken puppet-like head of the Mimikyu emerges slowly and sullenly from the darkness on top of his fridge. Locked into immobility by the sightless stare of those false eyes, he thinks he understands all too well. “I think I’m starting to.”


End file.
